Need Statement
Although IA has been documented to beneficially affect OA patients, drug delivery may be inhibited by a “leaky” synovium, characterized by an over-porous sub-synovial tissue leading to very short clearance times for injected drugs. To accurately characterize drug transport behavior, there is a need to develop a 3D model of synovium, or “E-SYN”, which models three components: synovial intima, sub-synovial tissue, and lymphatic vessels. Such a model would allow future drug screening and modeling of arthritic pathologies.
Scope
There is a current lack of integration between 3D bioengineering tissue constructs and research methods for articular joint diseases such as osteoarthritis that has inhibited the development of improved treatment options. We propose developing a test chamber that can characterize drug transport and bioactivity in order to accelerate the screening process for new drugs designed to treat osteoarthritis. This drug-testing platform is a closed system that will consist of a perfusable vascular network via a 3D carbohydrate-glass lattice that is embedded within an engineered synovium. To facilitate the study of compounds with varying molecular weights, a mathematical diffusion model will also be developed.